Newsletter Spring 2013 (Issue 10)

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The CAS newsletter "SWITCHED ON" is published once a term (approx.) and is made freely available for download from here. We welcome comments, suggestions and items for inclusion in future issues. Our goal is to put the fun back into computing at school. Will you help us?

Gamemaker is free for educational use. You'll find further details on their website at http://www.yoyogames.com The recent release of Game Maker Studio allows pupils to create games for iOS, Android, desktop and the Web (HTML5) and will produce an app store-ready iOS, Android or OS X app, Windows executable or HTML5 code, all at the push of a button and all from the same source code! See www.yoyogames.com/gamemaker/studio

computational thought - THE LITERACY OF THE 21st CENTURY

This is a shortened version of an article that was first published in The Telegraph on 17/11/2012. The full, unedited version can be found on Tom Crick's excellent blog, "Computing, The Science Of Nearly Everything" at http://drtomcrick.com/tag/computational-thinking/

Martin Saunders created and maintains Computing++, a website that brings coders and teachers together. It aims to support teachers and facilitate mentoring, particularly those new to coding. See the previous issue of SwitchedOn for a review and check out the website here: www.computingplusplus.org

geekEquality is passionate about empowering organisations to diversify their workforce through public engagement and diversity training. You can find out more about their work at http://www.geekequality.com/, which includes several excellent links to articles on the research page.

The following articles / papers were referenced in the feature:

Deem, R. (1981). "State Policy and Ideology in the Education of Women, 1944-1980." British Journal of Sociology of Education 2(2): 131 - 143.

Sophie McDonald is co-founder sketchPatch.net and MzTEK. sketchPatch is a programming playground based on the language Processing. It allows people to play with programming in a easy and fun way. You can write your own programs and run them in the browser, share them, or collaborate with other people making new versions of their programs. You'll find it at http://www.sketchpatch.net/index.html . MzTEK is a non-profit organisation with the aim of addressing the imbalance of women artists working in the fields of new media, computer arts, and technology. See http://www.mztek.org

TeenTech organise lots of events across many regions. You can find out more about their initiatives on their website: http://www.teentechevent.com/

TeenTech has introduced a competition for 11 to 16-year-olds, encouraging them to develop a project idea, form a team and collaborate with other schools or companies to try to resolve the problem. The Duke of York is patron of the awards scheme, which is designed to encourage entrepreneurship. Google is sponsoring the Education category, details of which can be found here: http://www.teentechevent.com/teentech-awards-2013/education/

teachers made welcome at pycon uk community meet

Nicholas Tollervey is a software developer, former teacher and one of the organisers PyconUK. This article is taken from a recent blog post of his. You can read the full article here: http://ntoll.org/article/pyconuk2012

Computing Curriculum

CAS are working on various guidance documents to amplify which will be posted here shortly. In the meantime do look at the CAS curriculum. This described in concrete terms what a Computing curriculum at school might look like but was produced prior to the new programme of study.

My Digital Life

My Digital Life is the Open University's introduction to Computing undergraduate module. It was developed by The Open University as a wide-ranging and comprehensive introduction to Computer Science, Information Technology, and Digital Literacy, as defined in the new Computing Programme of Study.
The OU in association with CAS are offering this to CAS members as a resource pack. Click for more information.